-
âWHEN IN DOUBT, LEAVE IT OUTâ
âWhen in doubt, leave it out.â I donât remember my grandfather, but his sage advice (handed down to me by my Mother) has guided me through many complicated decisions. Lately, especially. Iâm currently half-way through the first draft of my newest novel (praise the Lord!) and decided a few days ago to take a look over what Iâd already written, just in case things needed a little fine-tuning before I plunged ahead. Needless to say, they did. đ If youâve never written before or are new to the whole âauthoringâ process, please allow me to be the first to enlighten you: Editing is a good thing. Did you catch that?…
-
THE PURPOSE WILL FUEL THE PROCESS
âWhy?â When I was growing up, this was the number one question my father taught me to ask. âIf you donât know the âwhyâ behind something,â he would say, âthen there is no purpose.â I have come to discover he was right. In every arena of life, we must know the âwhyâ behind what is being said or done or else all becomes meaningless, mindless rhetoric and response. Without purpose we have no reason for doing anything, and without a reason we will never have the zeal necessary to persevere and accomplish what we were made to do. And nowhere is this more true than in the field of writing.…
-
STAY AUTHENTIC
âBut for my own part, if a book is well written, I always find it too short.â ~ Jane Austen It can be very difficult being a writer. Besides the actual work involved in creating something someone else will actually want to read, there is the seemingly never-ending string of critics and âexpertsâ who always have a better idea of how you should do your job. âCut this, add that, switch those words around, drop that character entirely, shorten that sentence, tighten that paragraph, and, yeah, basically start all over,â is the overall impression I get from most voices in the profession of modern literature. Certainly, they have a point.…
-
DON’T QUIT!
On midnight of June 28, 2017 I sent my first ever novel, “Sengali: A Cat’s Tale”, off to the printers. It was a lifelong dream come true that also became a profound lesson in grace and perseverance. Self-publishing can be a very challenging, rewarding, grueling, fascinating, exhausting, exhilarating, frustrating and ultimately triumphant process. On that night of June 28 I had been consumed by it for well over a year and, quite frankly, was utterly spent: mentally, physically, and emotionally. I had just pressed through what I thought was the last of more barriers than I could count when yet another one smacked me down. Only a technical problem…but it…
